1. Technical Field of the Invention
The invention relates generally to network security; and, more particularly, it relates to providing security within networks whose content includes Internet protocol television (IPTV) streams.
2. Description of Related Art
Internet protocol television (IPTV) is a service that is gaining evermore acceptance and popularity. One of the benefits of such IPTV services is that they can be delivered via an existing network that is already implemented and capable to service a number of other services (e.g., the Internet itself or a network operating in accordance with the transmission control protocol/Internet protocol (TCP/IP) protocol suite or such Internet compliant protocol). Originally, IPTV services were provided via unicast, but broadcast IPTV services are now gaining traction in the market place. By piggy-backing on such an existing network (e.g., the Internet), IPTV services can effectively be provided to a very broad range and high number of subscribers.
However, by provisioning such IPTV services on such an existing network (e.g., the Internet), these IPTV services, like many others that are provided via an existing network, are susceptible to many new attacks by hackers. There do exist some prior art approaches that attempt to ensure security of such IPTV services, but these existing solutions generally are geared towards providing rudimentary mechanisms to protect the IPTV system itself (e.g., generally using a perimeter of defense model), and they do not operate pro-actively to enable protection for internal/inside attack events such as denial of service (DoS) attacks and illegal IPTV services (e.g., service stealing, etc.).
These prior art approaches for IPTV network security typically employ mechanisms such as firewalls and access control lists perhaps along with some limited intrusion prevention mechanism. Again, these prior art approaches generally operate only to provide a perimeter of defense around the IPTV network. However, typical prior art approaches, in attempting to provide this perimeter of defense, still fail to provide adequate protection for outside attack and are susceptible thereto. Moreover, such prior art approaches provide no robust mechanism whatsoever to protect against insider attacks such as denial of service (DoS) attacks and illegal IPTV services (e.g., service stealing, etc.).